Computer systems and applications executing within the computer systems are often configured to implement security measures designed to thwart malicious activity, such as corrupting memory or accessing privileged information. For example, two separate authorized software applications may share a confidential passkey that the applications use to authenticate data transmissions. However, while such an authentication process reduces the security risk associated with a malicious user intercepting data transmissions, the security provided may be breached if the confidential pass key is obtained by the malicious user.
As illustrated by this example of data transmissions secured by passkey, maintaining the secrecy of some amount of data that is used by software applications is useful for implementing comprehensive security measures. In one attempt to limit the exposure of confidential data to unauthorized access, the confidential data is changed frequently. While this approach limits the vulnerability of the confidential data to the change interval, such an approach does not eliminate the vulnerability of the confidential data. Further, in some scenarios, the flexibility required to change confidential data periodically is not available or is too expensive to implement. Consequently, there is a need for securing confidential data used by software applications, particularly in the presence of a potentially compromised operating system, in a more effective manner.